Plastic worms are one of the most popular artificial fishing lures. They normally have elongated bodies formed of an extremely flexible, soft plastic of almost jelly-like consistency. They are used by threading them on fish hooks. The usual mode of applying a plastic worm to a hook is to insert the hook point into the nose of the worm and out at a point spaced from the nose a distance approximately equal to the length of the hook shaft. The impaled portion of the worm is slid around the throat of the hook and up the shank until the nose covers the hook eye. The hook point and a major portion of the curved section of the shank are then exposed exteriorly of the lure and will be snagged in underwater vegetation and trash when the hook is drawn through the water during fishing. To prevent this, it is a common practice to reinsert the point of the hook into, but not through, the worm body at the point of the worm lying opposite the point of the hook. The worm body itself then acts as a "weed guard," preventing the hook from being snagged by underwater vegetation and trash. This is often called "Texas Style" fishing. When a fish strikes, usually completely engulfing the hook in its mouth, the hook point is forced on through the worm body to be set in the fish's mouth, as permitted by the elastic stretch of the worm between the hook point and the hook eye, this being the section of the worm which previously served as a weed guard.
The practice outlined above is subject to certain difficulties and common malfunctions arising from the fact that it is difficult to fasten the worm body to the hook shank adjacent the eye with sufficient security to prevent slippage. The worm is very soft and has a virtually "self-lubricating" quality, so it slides freely on the shank of the hook. As a consequence, when a fish strikes, it often pulls the worm section embedded on the shank of the hook along the shank toward the point of the hook, causing the "weed guard" portion of the worm to be bunched or "wadded" into the throat of the hook, the bulk of this wadded section of the worm often fills the throat of the hook and actually shields the point so that it does not protrude from the worm, far enough only to slightly be properly set in the fish's mouth. Even when a fish does not strike, the bunching or wadding of the weed guard section of the worm in the throat of the hook often occurs when fishing in heavy underwater brush. The vegetation wadding the worm into the throat of the hook with the result that the hook cannot be set properly when a fish does bit. Furthermore, the user must rearrange the worm when he retrieves the lure for another cast. Various means for fastening the worm more securely to the hook shank have been proposed, such as forming barbs or lateral offsets in the hook, but none have been satisfactorily effective.
Early attempts to solve the preceding problem included the concept of forming barbs in the upper end of the hook shank right below the hook eye. The theory behind this adaptation was to provide a means to hold the head of the plastic worm in position. Unfortunately, the dimensions of the barbs are a function of the diameter of the hook shank and therefore are relatively small and do not create enough bite to hold a plastic lure such as a worm in place. R. Carver et al in U.S. Pat. No. 4,344,381 on "Fish Hook And Worm Lure Combination" attempted to solve this problem by providing an auxiliary shaft with barbs. This system had various shortcomings. For instance, this partially successful attempt to alleviate the problem of fastening baits to hooks has been provided by R. Carver et al in U.S. Pat. No. 4,334,381 on "Fish Hook And Worm Lure Combination" issued June 15, 1982. This device utilizes a barbed shaft secured to a hook eye and adapted to be forced into the nose end of a bait such as an artificial worm. Unfortunately, the barbed shaft interferes with the functioning of the hook during hook setting operations and is subject to being easily pulled off the hook and shaft combination in the event of a strike which does not completely engulf the bait.
R. Riggs, U.S. Pat. No. 3,978,606 on "Fish Hook and Worm Lure Combination" issued Sept. 7, 1976 attempted to solve the barbed shaft problem by providing a helical spring-like screw on the eye end of a hook so that the worm could be threaded onto the helix and held in place. Unfortunately, this attempt to solve the problem is far from satisfactory because the helix is welded to the shaft of the hook at the side closest to the barb rather than the eye so that it is impossible to thread a plastic worm onto the hook and then screw it up onto the helix. The worm has to be threaded on from the eye side and because of the dimensions of the helix and the fact that the smaller end opposite from where you must begin threading is welded to the shank of the hook, the device acts as a cover and simply cuts a section out of the plastic bait. Furthermore, a device such as that suggested by Riggs is costly to manufacture in that the hook has to be annealed and rust proofed after the welding operation. Even with special treatment, the weld point of the helix attachment site is a weak link in the hook and subject to failure if a fish strikes.
M. Martinek, U.S. Pat. No. 4,244,133 on "Barbed Fishing Lure With Pivoted Spring Means For Attaching A Plastic Worm Thereto" issued Jan. 13, 1981 is an improvement over the Carver device in that the barbed shaft is replaced by a wire spring adapted to be secured to the hook eye and threaded into the nose end of the bait. According to the teachings of Martinek, the shaft of the hook has to be bent to form a section approximately 90 degrees from the main hook shaft which supports the eye so that the artificial worm or similar bait may be screwed onto the wire up to but not including the eye without being deformed by the major length of the hook shank.
In Martinek, the eye of the corkscrew is closed into the closed eye of the fish hook. Thus, when a fish hits the rigged worm, the worm must be stretched until the point of the hook sticks through the worm before hook point can be set in the fish's mouth.
A major problem with devices constructed according to Martinek is that the tightly or closely coiled (see Column 2 Lines 53 et seq of U.S. Pat. No. 4,244,133) section of the spring cuts a core out of the bait as it is threaded on and as the result, the bait is easily pulled from the securing means.
Two critical and fatal flaws exists in the Martinek design. The tightly coiled section of the spring or the sharply bent hooked shank prevent the spring from being coiled about the hook shank and thus the bait cannot be threaded over the hook shank. This is a serious fault of such devices because the inability to thread the bait over the shaft significantly reduces the effectiveness of the bait. For instance, in Martinek, the fish feels the uncovered hook shank while the barb is still covered and usually spits out the obviously inedible and unpleasant feeling object. Irrespective of any other deficiencies of the device, this alone renders it impossible and unusable for effective fishing as witnessed by its obvious lack of commercial success.